The Ft. Lauderdale Winterfest Boat Parade was a grand affair. Ed, Luna and I took the dinghy to the mouth of Lake Sylvia looking out at the ICW at dusk and rafted up with two fellow Lake Sylvia boaters, Mikhail from the Ukraine and Craig from S. Africa. I have to admit my favorite part of the evening was hearing about the current politics between Russia and the Ukraine and historical politics in SA. Always interesting hearing about these issues from "the horse's mouth". But the parade was fun. Our camera wasn't set on a night setting and we couldn't quite figure that out but I got a few decent shots. The really large yachts were blaring funky music that had little relationship to holiday tunes and in order to pay for all that bling, I suppose they had to get sponsors. We saw Ford and Fox News and local yacht clubs displayed boldy. I said to Ed, "Where's the holiday music??" Once in awhile we'd hear something but it was usually drowned out by what we affectionately refer to as the obnoxious music. One of the mega yachts had a pretty decent fireworks show off their top deck. Luna would like to say that was her least favorite boat. The police were out in full and looked like they were expecting a riot or some sort of mass bedlam and bad behavior. It was a holiday parade, with families for goodness sake! The sailboats and fishing trawlers were our favorites. In this photo you get a good view of how the locals cover their tall palm trees in holiday lights. Some have colored lights; this has the "tasteful" white ones.